Irving, New York

The hamlet of Irving sits on the Lake Erie shore in Chautauqua County, on land that was part of the Haudenosaunee Cattaraugus Territory long before European settlement. The Seneca Nation of Indians, one of the six nations of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, retains territory here to this day, making this stretch of the southern Lake Erie shoreline one of the few places in New York where a Native nation holds continuous territorial sovereignty. The hamlet is generally said to be named for Washington Irving, the American author. The intersection of Seneca sovereignty, Erie shoreline geography, and the old New York State Route Twenty corridor makes Irving an easy place to drive through without realizing you are crossing Seneca Nation territory.